Bellevue Square

FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT BELLEVUE SQUARE - PAGE 5

A 31-year-old Windsor Locks man was listed in satisfactory condition Thursday night at St. Francis Hospital and Medical Center after being stabbed in the chest earlier in the day. Derrick Thomas was stabbed about 1:40 p.m. near 129 Clark St. Police were searching for a suspect they described as a Jamaican male, about 30 years old, with short hair and wearing a brown jacket. No further information was available on the stabbing. A 55-year-old Earle Street man was struck by a stray bullet Thursday afternoon as he was sitting near a second-floor window inside his apartment, police said.

Hartford homicide detectives arrested a 16-year-old youth Tuesday night in the slaying of a man last month in the Bellevue Square housing project. Jamar R. Privette of Hartford was charged with murder in connection with the killing of Keto Young, who was shot five times Dec. 17, the day after another man was killed in gang-related violence in the housing project. Privette was arrested after detectives picked him up for questioning, Sgt. Wayne Kornbrath said early today. Privette was seen at the housing project by police Tuesday night.

The high-rise Bellevue Square and Stowe Village housing projects are the newest targets in a sweeping plan to thin out and rebuild the worst of Hartford's public housing complexes. Under the plans, a third of the units would be removed at each of the crime-plagued North End complexes -- primarily through selective demolition, combining of apartments and elimination of common hallways and entrances. Doing away with the common spaces -- which serve as magnets for crime at the city's only three- and four-story projects -- is seen as key to improving conditions, housing officials say. Last month, a 14-year-old boy was chased into a Stowe Village hallway, shot execution-style in the head, robbed of his leather jacket and left dead.

Sometimes progress begins at the end of a wrecking ball. And so it is good news that the Hartford Housing Authority has finally received $5 million from the federal government to demolish about two-thirds of Stowe Village. The project is a ghastly eyesore. The maze of three-story buildings totaling 598 units is a self-contained community that attracts and breeds drug trafficking and other crime. Hartford is a leader in targeting densely populated public housing like Stowe Village and Charter Oak Terrace for demolition.

The nation's drug epidemic is not a city problem but a regional one. This ugly truth was highlighted once more last week when Hartford police arrested 16 people in another drug sting near the Bellevue Square housing complex. Most of the people arrested and charged for trying to buy heroin -- 12 to be exact -- were out- of-towners, from places such as Wethersfield, Glastonbury, New Britain and Wallingford. A sting at the same housing project in March had similar results: of the 17 people arrested, only one was from Hartford.

It's been nearly 20 years since Stevie J. Johnson, 37, ran for a touchdown or threw out a runner trying to steal second base. Johnson graduated in 1978 from Hartford Public High School, where he played varsity baseball and football. Now he does most of his scoring from the sidelines. And instead of racking up points in the scorebook, coach Johnson teaches kids not only to box out under the basket, but to open the books after school. "Most of these kids, they believe basketball is their ticket out of the ghetto," said Johnson, watching youths play at SAND Everywhere School on Monday.

By MARIA ALVAREZ and STAN SIMPSON; Courant Staff Writer Correction: Four people were shot near the corner of Cotswold venue and Homewood Place in hartford Monday night. Page 1 story in some editions Tuesday reported the location incorrectly. Two other people were injured onday night in shootings in the city. The total number injured was incorrectly reported in some editions., October 26, 1993

The lull in gang violence imposed by a heavy police presence was shattered by multiple shootings late Monday, leaving as many as seven people wounded in Hartford -- two of them critically. According to witnesses, a 41-year-old Hartford man was gunned down in the city's North End by three men armed with assault-style rifles. Other injuries were suspected to have resulted from drive-by shootings. Police reported seven people shot at 2 a.m. All the shootings occurred from 10 p.m. to 11:30 p.m., sending police and ambulances racing throughout the city.

Hartford Mayor Michael Peters on Sunday promised more police for fearful residents of the troubled Bellevue Square housing project, where two young men were killed by gunfire in the past three days. School officials, meanwhile, prepared to open the SAND Elementary School, which is in Bellevue Square, this morning with extra security guards and police on duty. Nicholas LaRosa, an assistant superintendent of schools, said two more security guards would be added this morning to the three already posted at SAND.

Hartford police posing as drug dealers in the Bellevue Square housing project Wednesday afternoon arrested 17 people who officers said drove in to buy heroin. Of the 17 accused, only one was from Hartford. The rest came from New Britain, Bristol, Newington, Enfield, South Windsor, Windsor, Middletown, Barkhamsted, Colebrook and Pawcatuck. "This particular area of Bellevue Square has a tremendous suburban- type clientele," Lt. Michael Fallon said. Members of the police street-crime unit held the undercover operation on the East Service Road of the housing project between 3 and 5 p.m. All those arrested were charged with criminal attempt to possess narcotics and third-degree criminal trespass.

Tenants of the Bellevue Square public housing complex in Hartford, who have had a year to adjust to the housing authority's plans to tear down nearly two-thirds of the 309 units and rebuild the rest, are mostly supportive of that plan, tenant representatives say. But at nearby Stowe Village, the mood is not as upbeat. Word that the authority wants to reduce that complex from 598 units to 187 rebuilt apartments and townhouses has some tenants worrying about relocation plans. "I think they should leave more units," said tenant Myrna Torres, "because where are they going to put all these people?"